


A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Zordon's Ship

by Goldmonger



Category: Power Rangers
Genre: Action/Adventure, Altruism, Gen, i love them together, the power of friendship amirite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-05
Packaged: 2018-10-15 06:11:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10551402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goldmonger/pseuds/Goldmonger
Summary: Zack and Jason try the superhero thing during a gas station hold-up. (A shameless rip-off of that MCU one-shot.)





	

*

 

 

There were exactly four brands of soft drinks on the refrigerator shelf, and Zack knew this well. Jason was leaning against the fridge next to it and tapping his foot impatiently, waiting for him to make a decision. It was 11pm on a Thursday and they were scouring the local Texaco for calories before training, something that was getting later and later as time went on. Kimberly blamed the frequent postponement of their sessions on studying for finals, while Trini straight up admitted she’d been bingeing Netflix for a few days and forgot she left her phone on the Morphing Grid. Because y’know, classic.

“Dude,” groaned Jason. “ _Pick_ one.”

“But like, doesn’t Monster give you radiation poisoning or something? I swear I read that somewhere.” Zack was puffy-eyed and washed out in the fluorescent lighting, peering at the variety of labels like they’d personally offended him. It had been a long day; the pair of them had spent the afternoon trying to decipher calculus homework – or at least that had been the plan. Jason had mostly used a calculator and Zack had spent hours learning the Cup Song from a Youtube video tutorial. Now they were off to pound the crap out of one another until the small hours of the morning, and then school, and more studying. Rinse, repeat.

“So get Red Bull,” said Jason wearily. “Or water. I literally couldn’t care less, we’ve been here for ages. Alpha’s going to be pissed, and you know how pitchy he gets when that happens.”

Zack made a theatrical gesture towards the shelf, as though he’d made a decision. At the last minute his hand swerved to the side, and he braced against the fridge door, stroking his chin like he was contemplating philosophy.

“Right,” said Jason curtly. “I’ll be in the car, counting to twenty, and you know I’ll leave when I hit it.”

He would. He had two weeks ago, and Zack and Trini had been forced to run to the quarry instead – which would have been a lot more satisfying if they hadn’t beat his dad’s truck there, whooping and hollering all the way.

Jason threaded through the shelving units and approached the counter laden with his party pack of Snickers bars, Billy’s Skittles, Trini’s iced tea and Kimberly’s flapjack. He’d started taking orders a few days ago, which was the most unbelievable thing of all. Sure, the plan was to rotate ‘catering’ duty, as they called it, but he always seemed to be up – all it took was a fluttering of eyelashes or a heartfelt comment about his leadership skills from one of the others and he was sold. It was a character defect he couldn’t bring himself to work on.

The girl at the counter was in her early twenties, short and blonde and thoroughly invested in whatever was blaring from her phone. Jason unloaded his items onto the bagging area, clearing his throat pointedly. Her eyes slid over him resentfully, but she did put her phone down and start scanning.

“Slow night,” he said in the beep-infested silence, and was happily ignored. He turned around, craning his neck to see whether Zack had made a decision yet, and found his eyes drawn to shapes swimming in the darkness outside the station’s windows. His brain configured the images into something resembling human just as the men burst into the store, both wearing hoodies, balaclavas and brandishing guns. The cashier screamed.

“Shut up!” One of the men, taller and broader, pointed his gun at the girl, who obeyed immediately. He threw an empty rucksack at her, drawing closer.

“Fill it with cash,” he snarled. “Quickly, or I blow your brains out.”

The other man seemed younger up close, his hands trembling slightly where they aimed a gun at Jason. He was blinking a lot, and kept reaffirming his grip on the trigger.

“Hey, man,” said Jason lightly. His senses seemed to be more heightened that usual – he could’ve sworn he could distinguish their jackrabbit heartbeats from the tinny overhead music and the drone of cars passing on the nearby highway. “Listen, you don’t have to -,”

“Who told you to speak?” bellowed the heftier guy, turning his gun on Jason as the cashier emptied the till between sobs. “ _Who told you to talk?_ ” He was closer now, breathing heavily as he loomed over him. “No heroes in here, big man, just stand there and act like a bitch and we’ll all get out of this just fine.” His tongue darted out to catch a string of spittle, his eyes too bright. On something then, maybe more used to whatever it was than the kid. Jason glanced at the latter, dread building in his stomach. His nerves felt frayed, twinging at the sounds of the girl’s crying – this was wrong, all of it, he could stop it, but _how_ with two of them and a lot of very un-enhanced flesh vulnerable to flying bullets -

Something moved in his periphery, and when he was confident the two assailants were more interested in the rattle of money coming from the counter, he let his eyes slide over to where Zack was crouched a few feet away, hidden behind a rack of candy bars. He looked spooked, but once he met Jason’s gaze he started mouthing intensively, a stream of words that were incomprehensible from this distance. Jason was about to hiss something distinctly unbecoming of a superhero when the younger robber poked him in the chest with the gun.

“What you – what you lookin’ at?” he asked, throwing a petrified look towards the big one, who was snapping at the girl to hurry up. “Dickhead,” he tacked on, although his tone made it sound more like a question.

“Nothing,” said Jason. He tried the diplomatic approach, regretting it before he even made the attempt. He just hoped his skin could stop a bullet if it came to that, so long as it didn’t ricochet or anything. “Hey, are you… from around here?”

“No! You don’t know me!” the kid was suddenly skittish as a cat surrounded by bloodhounds, the barrel of the gun pressing a tattoo into Jason’s sternum.

“You don’t have to do this,” urged Jason. “I know it’s hard out there, you might be going through some things. It can be rough. But there’s always another - ,”

“ _I thought I made it clear I didn’t want any heroes?_ ” The snarl came from the kid’s burly companion, who looked as enraged as a bull, flared nostrils and all. He grabbed the kid by the hood of his sweatshirt and shoved him towards the counter, where the girl was sweeping up the last of the cash, her cheeks shining with tears. “Idiot,” he spat at the kid, striding towards Jason. A different gun was held to Jason’s head, and the click of the safety being turned off was like a visceral blow. He scowled, suddenly feeling the weight of the eighteen hours he’d been awake. Screw this.

He squared his shoulders, choreographing the fight in his mind’s eye before it happened to prevent anyone getting seriously hurt.

His rumination was interrupted by an all too familiar battle cry that made them all jump. Jason recovered quickest, ducking and jabbing his elbow into the big guy’s solar plexus as Zack careened over the counter, clotheslining the younger guy as he did so. The girl was screaming again.

A gun went off and Jason jumped up, his heart in his mouth as he searched for Zack, or blood, or both; but the shot had come closer to home, and he barely had time to dodge Big Guy’s sloppy right hook before the gun was in his face again, its owner wheezing and clutching his abdomen.

“You _fucking_ -,”

There was a heavy _thwack_ , and Big Guy’s face went slack, his frame wilting as he passed out. Jason looked up at the cashier, who had just pelted her phone at the robber’s head, and Zack, who was frozen with the kid in a now unnecessary chokehold – his face was turning purple.

“Zack -,”

“Got it.” He dropped the kid unceremoniously, skipping neatly over his unconscious body to join Jason in staring at the fallen behemoth. They both watched the cashier pick her way over to retrieve her phone, cautiously wiping blood off with the big guy’s sleeve. She met their gaze and shrugged.

“It has Spotify Premium,” she said defensively.

“Call the cops,” said Jason, a little louder than he intended. The girl pursed her lips rather huffily, but swiped up a keypad and started dialling.

Jason and Zack appraised one another.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. You?”

“Yeah.”

They considered their options, which Jason decided on when he slapped a twenty on the counter and gathered up their purchases.

“You have security cameras in here?” he asked the girl, who was on with an operator. She shook her head, frowning.

“Good. Look, wait outside for the police, okay? Take off if they wake up, although -,” he nudged the big guy with his foot – “they shouldn’t for a while. Okay?”

The girl looked dubious about their intentions, but inclined her head, returning her attention to the 911 call. Jason gently pushed Zack in the direction of the door, stepping over fallen wares and prostrate legs as they went. Jason’s dad’s truck was mercifully untouched, and they clambered into it, waiting for the sound of incoming sirens before Jason started it. The girl had followed them out, and was waiting beside a filling station, again glued to her phone.

“We were never here!” Zack shouted from the rolled down passenger seat window, and the girl gave them a mock thumbs-up, her rolling eyes visible even as they pulled away into the night.

They passed the cops going the opposite direction, releasing the breath they’d been holding once they were into the empty dirt roads and open fields that led them out of Angel Grove. The moon was small and wan above them, the night silent but for the rumble of the truck and the faint hoots of hunting owls.

After a while Zack held up a can of Red Bull, a jagged rip disfiguring one side of it, still dripping.

“Shit,” he said, and Jason started laughing so hard he had to pull over.


End file.
